Post navigation

One-on-one interview with Rudy turns into game of one-on-one

Yesterday I had a one-on-one interview scheduled with Rudy Giuliani, who visited his California campaign headquarters in Glendale. (Watch for the interview in tomorrow’s Daily News.) I have to say that I’ve seen candidates running behind schedule time after time, but Giuliani was running ahead of schedule: I arrived at about 2:10 p.m., five minutes before he was scheduled to address supporters, but when I walked in the former New York City mayor was wrapping up his speech.

After he spent some time kibbitzing with cell-phone-camera-wielding fans, he was ready to sit down with me in a small office with a rectangular table, an office chair on each side. Rudy was already sitting in one of the chairs, just having wrapped up a phone-in interview with a radio station. I walked in, greeted him and shook his hand. And since I try to be a consummate professional, I’ll note that the following dialogue is how I remember it, but I can’t guarantee 100 percent accuracy as my digital recorder wasn’t yet on.

“Have a seat, Bridget,” Giuliani said as I sat in the rolling desk chair. Then, with a gesture to the side and an eye on the corner of the room, he said, “Move over a bit. You’re blocking my three-pointer!”

I scooted to the side and looked over my shoulder to the small wastebasket in the sparsely furnished office. Giuliani decides he’s going to go for the shot, pauses, then quickly chugs the rest of the water in the stout, half-size bottle he was drinking from. He replaced the cap, wound up for the pitch, had a last-minute change of heart, then grabbed a full, unopened half-size bottled water off the desk, where a handful of bottles were lined up. Giuliani pitches the full bottle at the trash can. It hits the wall with a THWACK and falls to the floor.

Undeterred, Giuliani, who may have ingested one too many Red Bulls, pitches the empty water bottle at the trash can. This time, the bank off the wall makes it in the trash can. Giuliani rejoices! Then, he was finally ready for the interview.

This story is much better, by the way, acted out to one’s co-workers. But a few colleagues made interesting points: Was this something Giuliani did to look fly in front of a younger journalist? Was he worked up from his pep rally? Or was it an “I’m fun” moment like the cell phone call from his wife that he took while stumping to the NRA?